


Not That Kind of Dangerous

by DesireeArmfeldt, orphan_account



Series: Parallel Inclinations [1]
Category: due South
Genre: Alternate Universe, M/M, POV First Person, POV Outsider, Pining
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-02-01
Updated: 2012-02-01
Packaged: 2017-10-30 10:49:39
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,132
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/330914
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DesireeArmfeldt/pseuds/DesireeArmfeldt, https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Set in the universe of Sock_Marionette's "Inclinations" series, in which Ray K and Fraser are flatmates, Fraser is asexual, Ray has one-night stands with other people, and there's a whole lot of pining going on.  </p><p>One of Ray's one-night stands gets a glimpse of Ray and Fraser on the job.</p><p>Slightly more angsty/less optimistic than the stories in the original series.  Not porn, but brief sexual explicitness.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Not That Kind of Dangerous

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [A Question of Inclination](https://archiveofourown.org/works/320348) by [orphan_account](https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account). 



> (The story itself is not actually co-authored; AO3 seems to have tagged it that way because the *series* is listed as co-authored.)

It’s not a low-risk activity, picking up guys in gay bars, even if you avoid the joints where people go because they’re actively looking to get fucked up, fucked over, fucked out of their minds.  I used to go to those places a lot when I was younger, and I did my share of getting fucked up.  The one thing I can say for the dumb-ass way I spent my twenties is that I eventually developed decent radar for seriously dangerous people and seriously stupid ideas.  And—eventually—I learned to leave those alone.

 

So, I don’t go to the skuzzy places any more.  I’m not looking for a guy who’s going to get me wasted, fuck me hard, and dump me out of his car in an alley at three in the morning.  I’m not looking for a long-term relationship with someone who’s distant or violent or charming or clingy and weepy depending on how the dice rolled when he got out of bed in the morning.  I just want to find a halfway nice-looking guy of a certain age to have a simple fuck in a motel room, go home, and get up for work in the morning.

 

But even in the tamer bars, this game is mostly-safe at best, so guys who make a habit of pick-ups are either so desperately lonely that lust trumps fear, or else they get a kick out of taking risks.  I know which bucket I fall into.

 

So, I was sitting in Sonny’s on a Thursday night, nursing a beer and feeling pissed off at the world because of the latest round of bullshit at work.  And then this guy blew in.  Scrawny aging punk with bleached, gelled hair, weathered face all chin and cheekbones, and a scowl that could take paint off the walls. 

 

My first thought was _Hey, someone’s having a worse day than I am._  My next was to wonder whether he was here to start a fight _._   Happens occasionally: jealous boyfriends, once in a while an angry father, drive-by fag-bashers.  I figured I’d better keep an eye on him, be ready to mix in if the guy started making trouble.  Plus, it was hard _not_ to look at him: he was no beauty queen, but he was a live wire, I could practically feel the charge flickering around him, looking for somewhere to spark.

 

He scanned the room slowly, then _bam!_ his glare locked on me and he came stalking over like a panther scenting lunch.  I couldn’t tell if he was planning to deck me or haul me off into the men’s room or what, but my body responded both ways at once: _fight, fuck, go go go_.

 

I stood up as he got to me.  I had a couple of inches on the guy as well as probably thirty or forty pounds, and was pretty sure I could take his skinny ass in a fight, but he got right up in my face with no sign of fear.

 

“What are you looking at?” he growled softly.  “You got a problem with me?”

 

“Not yet,” I said.  “You want to make one?”

 

“Nah,” he drawled.  “I want to fuck somebody’s brains out.  And I don’t want to be particularly gentle about it.”  He didn’t back off an inch, just cocked his head and lifted his eyebrows at me, more like a challenge than an invitation.

 

“I don’t mind rough,” I said.  “But nobody gets tied up and nobody gets hurt for real.  If you’re looking to get your ass kicked, I can do that for you here and now and then you can go home.”

 

He scowled so fiercely that I thought for a minute he was going to go for the brawling option, but then his shoulders dropped and his face relaxed partway, which made him look a lot prettier.

 

“Deal,” he said.

 

We went to a fleabag hotel nearby where they’re used to guys who come in pairs and pay in cash.  As soon as I got the door closed, the guy nailed me to the wall with hot, hungry kisses, and yeah, live wire all right, all that anger and energy passing from him to me, I felt like I was being electrocuted.  When he got too pushy, I pushed back, literally shoved him hard enough to send him stumbling back a couple of paces.  He grunted in surprise but recovered fast and flashed me a predatory grin, then grabbed me by the wrists and tried to wrestle me over to the bed.  I didn’t object to the destination, but I wasn’t going to let the guy toss me around, and I didn’t think that was what he wanted from me, either.  So I dug in my heels and pulled him into a bear hug that lifted his heels off the ground.  He flailed and wriggled, but I kept my grip on him long enough to take the couple of steps over to the bed and fling him down on it.

 

I stood over him, ready to put him down again if he came back at me either for play or for real.  But he just lay there sprawled where I’d dumped him and grinned up at me.  This was a different kind of smile, amused and sunny, and it made him look like a cocky teenager.  He raised one hand and beckoned to me with all his fingers.  _Come on, bring it on, I’m ready for you._

 

“You going to make me fight you all fucking night?” I asked him.

 

He gave a lazy shrug and wriggled his lean body, which made his t-shirt ride up, showing a slice of skin above his black jeans.

 

“I’m open to suggestion.”

 

I picked up his feet and started wrestling off his combat boots; he lay back and watched me through half-closed eyes, docile, intent, smirking.  I kicked off my own sneakers without bothering to untie them and climbed onto the bed, straddling him—and like I’d more than half expected, he flew into motion, toppling me and nearly rolling us both off the bed.  We grappled and wrestled, testing each other’s strength (he had more than I’d given him credit for, the wiry bastard), groping whatever body parts came to hand.  I caught a flying elbow across the nose that made my vision blur for a moment, and a couple of times he gave a grunt of real pain when I caught him across the ribs, but hey, no pain, no gain.  There was some laughing and grunting and quite a lot of cursing and panting, and it felt a lot like being back in high school except both of us knew we were actually going to get some any minute now.

 

Finally I got him pinned on his back, using my weight advantage to keep him down while I tickled his ribs, his belly, under his arms, while he flailed his arms uselessly like someone’s little brother, laughing his head off.  I shoved his elbows up so I could pull his t-shirt over his head, but pulled up short at the sight of the purple bruise covering the left side of his ribcage.

 

“’Samatter?” he asked, slightly muffled by the shirt stuck over his head.  He thrashed free of it on his own as I gently touched the edge of the bruise.

 

“Hey, knock it off, that’s sore,” he groused at me.

 

“I’ll bet,” I said.  “You should have warned me before I started pummeling you.”

 

“Psh, don’t worry about it.”  He waved a dismissive hand.  “This is nothing, I get worse all the time.”

 

“How’d you get it?” I asked.

 

“Oh, I got a friend who gets his jollies out of endangering my life in wildly bizarre ways.”  He said it offhandedly, but I could feel his body starting to tense up a little under mine.

 

I swung myself off him quick and knelt beside him, giving him some space, looking at his face and trying to guess how bad this was.  Everyone’s got their shit, fine, but I didn’t want to get myself into the middle of someone’s abusive relationship, or be the tool he used to fuck himself up farther.

 

He must have seen my thoughts on my face, because he sat up and put his hand on my forearm.

 

“Hey, no, no, no, it’s not like that,” he said.  “I don’t mean he—God, don’t go thinking—he’s not the one that did this to me.  I got a dangerous job, that’s all, this is like one of those on-the-job injuries.”

 

I frowned.  “What about your friend, then?”

 

“We work together, we’re partners, work-type partners.”  He sighed.  “Look, I’m a cop, all right?  Don’t freak out, I’m a detective, homicide.  Off-duty.  I’m not looking to get anyone in trouble, I’m honestly just trying to get laid for Chrissake, but this is why I don’t go around telling guys I pick up what I do for a living.  Okay?”

 

“All right.”  He could have been lying, of course, but I didn’t think so, and Jesus, a cop who picks up strangers in gay bars, that suggested all sorts of reasons for the anger the guy was carrying around.  But it didn’t have to be the only fucked up thing about his life, either.

 

“So, you got that, what. . .?”

 

“Shot,” he said.  “By a bank robber.  I was wearing a vest, hooray for me, so instead of bleeding my guts out on the sidewalk I just feel like I got sucker-punched by a heavyweight.  Also I got thrown out a window right after that, but I landed in a dumpster so mostly I just banged up my elbows a bit.”  He raised his elbow for my inspection like a kid showing off a boo-boo.

 

“So what does all this have to do with your partner?”

 

“ _He_ don’t wear a vest.  Or carry a gun.  Well, he carries one, but it’s not loaded.  And he has a habit of walking up to armed goombahs and daring them to shoot him.”  The little-kid look was gone, the jittery tension was dialing up; one hand started tapping restlessly against his knee, while the other flashed in rapid gestures to underscore his words.  “Also, he’s just got like some kind of freak-field he carries around with him.  Before I started working with him, there was the getting shot at and the getting slugged and the chasing perps down alleys, you know, like on TV except without so many explosions.  With him, there’s all that plus driving cars that are on fire, and jumping off of roofs and through windows and into lakes, and getting kidnapped by batshit spies who drive worse than I do, and drowning on sinking ships, and _he don’t even notice that it’s fucking dangerous!”_   Without warning he was up on his knees, spinning and slamming his fist into the wall.

 

“Hey, hey, take it easy.”  I put a hand on his shoulder, light and easy, but ready to grab him if he threw the next punch at me.  But there wasn’t a next punch.  He slumped back down on the bed and scrubbed his hands over his face.

 

“Sorry,” he muttered.  “I don’t know how this turned into me telling you my life story.  I thought we came here to do the horizontal mambo.”

 

“Well, sure,” I said.  “But—don’t take this wrong, but you seem like maybe you’re not okay.  And I don’t want to fuck things up for you more, you know?”

 

“Yeah, I can see where you’d think that, but no, I’m fine, really.  Well, not fine-fine, obviously.”  He checked out his bruised knuckles, then shook the fingers out with a rueful roll of the eyes.  “But I’m not, like, in trouble.  And I don’t want you thinking—what you were thinking about me, him and me.  See, before I met him, I was pretty messed up.  I mean drinking, stalking my ex, pissing off my superior officers, doing dangerous shit, barely keeping it together.  But now I—he helps me with my paperwork and he makes me eat my fucking vegetables, and when I leave work I go home with him and we watch hockey, or we go help organize a Neighborhood Watch down in the projects, or we coach kids at boxing.  Or I invite some of the guys from the station over for poker—because he’d never think to do that, he still don’t really get how to do friends, but hey, somehow we’ve got friends, the two of us.  And then we go to work and we chase bad guys and jump off buildings, and it’s seriously dumb and scary but it makes me so fucking happy.  To be part of something like that.  Not many people get the chance.  And sure, some days I’d like to kick him in the head, and sure, I wish I’d wake up some morning and find him cuddled up to me in bed, but, well, that ain’t going to happen, and I’d still rather be with him than anywhere else.  And it ain’t his fault.  Well, the not carrying a gun and trying to get himself killed on a daily basis, that’s his fault, but not the part where I want—and he can’t—“

 

I scooted up beside him and pulled him up against my chest, wrapped my arms around him.  He twitched once and then went limp against me.  Made a sound that wasn’t quite either a laugh or a sob.

 

“Fuck it,” he mumbled into my shoulder.  “Fuck me, why don’t you?  Or I can do you, either way.  Somebody ought to have a good time tonight.”

 

“I’m not going to—“

 

“Oh, for Chrissake!  I promise you, I’m not fragile, I’m not broken, I’m in love with my best friend and I can’t screw him, but I could have died today and I didn’t and I just want to fucking celebrate, okay?  I don’t want to do nothing you’re not cool with, but believe me, you want to stay, just about anything you do is going to make me feel better.  All right?”

 

“All right,” I said.  “You still in the mood for rough?”

 

He pulled back his head so he could see me and that grin, the predatory one, slowly crept over his face.

 

All in all, it turned out to be one of the best nights out I’ve had for a while.  The guy knew what he was doing, and he was 100% present and committed, whether giving or taking.  I remember looking up at him as he was pounding my ass—face-to-face with a stranger, for God’s sake!—seeing those burning eyes watching me intently, tenderly, as though I were the answer to all his prayers.  And I thought, _His friend must be a colossal dumb-ass._

 

I thought about him a bunch over the next few days, wondering whether he was all right.  I even went to Sonny’s a couple of nights running to look for him, but he wasn’t there, and you don’t go asking around about people there, so I didn’t.

 

And then a couple of weeks later, I’m walking down the street after work, figuring I’ll stop off for a beer before heading home.  I’m just about to take the shortcut through the alley by the godawful Chinese restaurant when I hear brakes screaming and horns blaring, and a car cuts off the street into the alley right in front of me, just misses knocking me down along with a couple other pedestrians.  It slams to a halt, and holy shit, there’s a guy in a stoplight-red coat clinging to the roof of the car, except now the driver’s out of the car and grappling with him.  A second car, black, with a red light flashing, skids into the alley, and the driver jumps out yelling “Chicago PD!”  Then he launches himself over the hood of his own car at a guy who’s swarming out of the passenger seat of the original car, and this guy’s got something black in his hand.  He and the cop grapple with each other, hands struggling for control of— _gun, must be a gun_ —and someone yells “Ray, look out!” and suddenly the guy in black is flying over the head of the guy in red, crashing into the pair who are tussling for the gun.  All three of them go down in a crashing heap of trashcans and flailing limbs, and there’s a _crack_ that hurts my ears, and for a second it seems like everything is still and silent, the world on pause. 

 

Then the guy in red vaults over the car hood and hauls someone out of the mess, pinning the guy’s arms behind his back without even looking at him, and shouting “Ray? Ray?  Are you all right?” at the trashcans.

 

There’s some thrashing and cursing, then the cop struggles to his feet, holding the fourth man down with one hand while fumbling out a pair of handcuffs.  Now that everyone’s standing still, I see that the cop is skinny, blond, fortyish—in fact, as if this whole episode needed to feel any more surreal, he’s my date from Sonny’s, and the part of my mind that isn’t just looping _holy shit coulda died_ over and over thinks: _I guess he was telling the truth about his job._

 

The guy in the red coat has dark hair and a handsome face and must be the work-type-partner.  He’s watching the guy from Sonny’s— _Ray_ —cuff his prisoner.  Doesn’t take his eyes off of Ray, in fact, until Ray’s shoved the handcuffed guy into the back seat of the black car and slammed the door.  Partner-guy guides his own prisoner rather more gently in.  Then he comes around the car and starts brushing Ray off, or maybe feeling him for injuries, while Ray swats at him like a teenager whose mom is trying to straighten his clothing.  They’re both talking: I can’t hear the words, but they look like a married couple bickering, one part irritated, two parts fond.  The partner says something that makes Ray’s split in that grin that makes him look like he’s about fourteen.  His partner’s smile is less brilliant, but no less loving.  He drops a hand on Ray’s shoulder, and my throat aches, because even from this distance the love between these guys is obvious.

 

And part of me wants to go up and grab the guy in the ridiculous red coat and shake him, yell _Why are you such a dumb-ass?_   And part of me wants to go up to Ray and put my arm around his shoulder, whisper in his ear, _Hey, buddy, where do I go to get my shot at what you’ve got?_


End file.
